Postdoctoral Research Associate

Job id: 084607. Salary: £43,205 to £46,732 per annum, including London Weighting Allowance.

Posted: 20 February 2024. Closing date: 19 March 2024.

Business unit: IoPPN. Department: Psychological Medicine.

Contact details:Dr Gemma Modinos. [email protected]

Location: Denmark Hill Campus. Category: Research.

Job description

We are looking for a Postdoctoral Research Associate to join Dr. Gemma Modinos’ research team ( https://modinoslab.com ) in the Department of Psychological Medicine at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience (IoPPN), King’s College London. The position is funded by a National Institutes of Health R01 subaward to Dr Modinos, and is available for 3 years (with the potential to extend by an additional 2 years thereafter).

As the successful candidate you will work as part of a multidisciplinary research team investigating relationships between schizotypy and brain functional and structural connectivity measures using a large-scale global ENIGMA consortium dataset (ENIGMA Schizotypy;  enigma.ini.usc.edu ). The project also involves a close collaboration with the ENIGMA Schizophrenia working group to analyse brain connectivity across a psychosis continuum, including the use of machine learning for outcome prediction.

You will be responsible for neuroimaging analysis of resting-state fMRI, diffusion (DTI) and T1-weighted MRI data, and the collation and synthesis of behavioural data across multiple international sites from healthy individuals with varying degrees of self-reported schizotypy. Skill development in image analysis will be supported in-house and by workshop attendance and include collaborative implementation of ENIGMA pipelines (e.g., HALFpipe). You will be supported and expected to disseminate findings from this project at scientific conferences and journals. You will also be supported in your career aspirations and the development of both domain-specific and general skills toward independence.

At King’s, we are deeply committed to embedding good equality and diversity practice into all of our activities so that the university is an inclusive, welcoming and inspiring place to work and study, regardless of age, disability, gender reassignment, marital status, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion, sex or sexual orientation.

We encourage and welcome applications from across the global community and all appointments are made solely on merit. We particularly welcome applications from black and minority ethnic candidates as they are under-represented within the university at this level.

This post will be offered on a fixed-term contract for 3 years, with an option to extend by a further 2 years.

This is a full-time post – 100% full time equivalent.

Key responsibilities

• To take a lead role in the synthesis and collation of a large dataset comprising behavioural data and multimodal neuroimaging data from multiple international research sites. Data management, quality control and synthesising data into analysable variables will all be required for this role.
• To preprocess and analyse resting-state fMRI, DTI and T1-weighted MRI data from healthy individuals with varying degrees of self-reported schizotypy.
• To organise and manage neuroimaging data, conduct statistical analyses and interpretation, prepare scientific manuscripts and disseminate results at scientific meetings.
• To operate independently with regular mentoring as part of a strong multidisciplinary team.
• To work collaboratively with others in the direct research team, the wider research teams within the IoPPN and within the ENIGMA consortium.
• To continually update own knowledge and understanding of the field and practical skills in neuroimaging data analyses.
• To develop own research interests.
• To contribute to administrative and other duties as directed.

*The above list of responsibilities may not be exhaustive, and the post holder will be required to undertake such tasks and responsibilities as may reasonably be expected within the scope and grading of the post. *

Skills, knowledge, and experience

**Essential criteria **

PhD in neuroimaging, computer science, bioinformatics, medicine, neuroscience, psychology or equivalent.*

Experience of acquiring and analysing brain MRI data from human participants (e.g., FreeSurfer, FSL, SPM).

Good publication record within the relevant field.

Self-motivated, reliable, able to work effectively as part of a research team and motivation to contribute to a good research culture.

Excellent time-management and organisational skills, including ability to prioritise and manage multiple tasks.

Familiarity with effective communication across collaborating groups.

High level of competence in written and spoken English.

Interested in further developing advanced neuroimaging data analysis skills.

Desire to develop own academic / research career in related areas.

Desirable criteria

Proficiency in programming (MATLAB, Python, R, Unix/Linux shell, and/or other languages).

Prior experience in engaging with an international network.

Experience of supervising more junior staff or students.

* Please note that this is a PhD level role but candidates who have submitted their thesis and are awaiting award of their PhDs will be considered. In these circumstances the appointment will be made at Grade 5, spine point 30 with the title of Research Assistant. Upon confirmation of the award of the PhD, the job title will become Research Associate and the salary will increase to Grade 6.